A headline in the WJS this week piqued my curiosity. “McDonald’s Turns to Social Media to Draw Millennials: Fast-food chain recently hired 200 people to bolster its digital efforts and win back young adults.” Julie Jargon writes that McDonald’s is beefing up its corporate digital marketing team in hopes that this fresh team of 20-something’s will revitalize slumping sales among younger consumers with their magic social media wands. I found no press release regarding the digital hiring boom but clearly this article was pitched by a P.R. firm to garner coverage implying that this new endeavor is going to help McDonald’s get a bigger bite from the Millennial market.

How is it that, in 2016, one of the world’s largest and most valuable brands is just now realizing the importance of a strong digital team? This pivot by McDonald’s represents a prime example of ineffective corporate culture that Unilever CMO Keith Weed calls a generation of marketers leading business today who are bluffing about their knowledge of the digital landscape. Maybe that’s a reason why, at the same time the company is on-boarding Millennials in droves, a number of senior executives are leaving.

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